1. Field of the Invention
The instant invention relates generally to toy musical instruments, such as pianos and similar key operated instruments, and more particularly pertains to refinements in the keyboard assembly employed within such instruments.
2. Prior Art
The manufacturing and assembling of the several components of the keyboard assembly represents a major cost factor in the production of toy musical instruments, such as pianos. Accordingly, when faced with rapidly escalating costs of raw materials and labor, toy manufacturers have sought, inter alia, new designs for the keyboard assembly that will enable the continued production of an attractive product at a competitive price. Thus, numerous innovative keyboard designs have been proposed, and a lesser number have been developed, reflecting the keen competition within the toy instrument industry.
One simplified keyboard assembly is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 2,837,004, granted June 3, 1958 to Daniel J. Volpe. Such patent discloses die-formed sheet metal keys which have apertures defined in their sidewalls, so that a laterally extending metal rod can be passed therethrough. Grommets are assembled on the rod and then snapped into the holes; the grommets serve as bearings for the keys and also laterally align the keys with respect to one another.
An even simpler keyboard assembly, executed in plastic, is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,057,244, granted Oct. 9, 1962 to Charles Pearson. Such patent discloses a base 10 having a lower section with a series of spaced, key supports 12 and an upper section for seating a plurality of tone bars 40. As shown in FIG. 4 of Pearson, a key 44 is secured to each support for pivotal movement and a hammer 54 is situated at the rear end of the key to strike a tone bar disposed thereabove.
Another keyboard assembly, which was designed principally for full sized musical instruments but which may have applicability to toy musical instruments, if cost considerations can be met, is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,512,442 granted May 19, 1970 to Gunnar O. Sjostrand. Such patent depicts a pivotally mounted key 1 that has a resilient tongue 2 attached to its upper surface. A hammer is secured to the free end of the tongue, and, when the key is depressed, the hammer is propelled against string 4 to produce a sharp, clean tone. Since the rear surface of the key is beveled and a sound damping coating 8 may be applied thereto, the tonal quality of the instrument is greatly enhanced and the undesirable reverberation of the hammer will be eliminated.
All of the keyboard assemblies discussed above suffered from one or more shortcomings. For example, the sheet metal keys proposed by Volpe necessitated the use of grommets snapped into apertures on the sidewalls of each key to attain proper alignment upon a common shaft; also a separate wooden striker was secured to the rear of the key lever to serve as a hammer for striking the tone bars. No provision was made to dampen unwanted vibrations of the hammer. While Pearson proposed a molded plastic keyboard assembly with discrete key supports that was far simpler to assemble than the Volpe keyboard assembly, Pearson did not address the problem of damping unwanted vibrations of the hammer.
While the beveled key surface and sound dampening coating of Sjostrand did provide for the elimination of unwanted vibrations, such solution was costly and therefor not readily applicable to mass produced, relatively inexpensive toy musical instruments. Also, the key lever, resilient tongue and hammer were formed as distinct components that were subsequently joined together by known fasteners. However, the costs of forming and joining together these distinct components further added to the costs of the Sjostrand keyboard assembly.
Diverse other keyboard assemblies have been proposed, including sundry attempts to produce an integrally formed key capable of performing multiple efforts. None of these assemblies has achieved wide spread commercial success.